


2 Possible Futures

by StarFlower_Ink



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Big Brother Peter Parker, Big Sister Nebula, CEO Peter Parker, F/F, F/M, Family Feels, Grief, Haven't decided on pairing yet, Not Spider-Man: Far From Home Compliant, Peter Parker Lives, Peter survives the Snap, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-27
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-18 04:36:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29728440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarFlower_Ink/pseuds/StarFlower_Ink
Summary: In a world where Peter Parker survives the snap, and Mr. Stark dusts instead, how will the world move on?Inspired by Guilty As Charged by Ember_Darla, and Turning Tables by IAmAllYetnotAtAll.
Relationships: Cindy Moon/Peter Parker??, Pepper Potts/Tony Stark, Peter Parker/Shuri?
Comments: 2
Kudos: 28





	1. Titan

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Guilty As Charged](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23623219) by [Ember_Darla](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ember_Darla/pseuds/Ember_Darla). 
  * Inspired by [Turning Tables](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20836850) by [IAmAllYetNotAtAll](https://archiveofourown.org/users/IAmAllYetNotAtAll/pseuds/IAmAllYetNotAtAll). 



> Hi! I have other stories on Wattpad, but this is new, and has yet to be put there. I hope you like it! I’m a huge Spideychelle fan, but i wanted to try something new.

Standing on the desolate surface of Titan, Peter clutched tightly to the arm of the blue android, (and would that be the right term for her?), beside him. She was the only one left…

**FLASHBACK**

_“Hey, what was that?”_

_“I went forward in time to view alternate futures. To see all the possible outcomes of the coming conflict.”_

_“How many did you see?”_

_“14,000,605.”_

_“How many did we win?”_

_“….Two.”_

**_—————_ **

_“Do not let him close his fist.”_

_(Orange sparks surround Peter’s body, and he really needs to ask Mr. Doctor Strange about that cloak at some point.)_

_“Magic.”_

_“More magic”_

_(Wow, these portals are almost as cool as swinging around Queens.)_

_“Magic with a kick!”_

_“Magic with a—“_

_(And suddenly he’s snatched out of the air mid-swing by a meaty purple hand, that wraps around his throat, and he needsneedsneeds air, and then he’s flying again, choking and gasping—- as the purple grape gives a yell)_

_“Insect!”_

_“Actually, spiders are arachnids”,_

_( he says, but it’s lost in the boom of a missed shot by Mr. Stark, (Dad), and of thank God he’s okay because if he fell apart then Peter surely would too.)_

_(He shoots a web towards Thanos, and is ashamed by his straining because he’s lifted a building off of himself in a sweatshirt and pajama pants, he’s supposed to be able to lift over 25 tons, and it just doesn’tmakesense, and his mind is moving too fast, but suddenly both teen and Titan are distracted by the crash of a space shuttle, and a strong looking female comes hurtling out towards Thanos in all her purple and blue glory.)_  
**_———————————-_ **  
_(Peter’s done it, he’s webbed the bad guy and held him in place, and the adorable antennae lady is on his head, (and he doesn’t envy her that), and then she’s crying, and it’s a desperate struggle to get the gauntlet off because if he doesn’t get it off then people will die, and “if they die, it’s on him”.)_

_“He is in anguish…”_

_“He mourns!”_

_“He took her to Vormir. He came back with the Soul Stone…but she didn’t.”_

_“Okay, Quill, you gotta cool it right now, understand?”_

_“Don’t, don’t, don’t engage, we’ve almost got this off!”_

_(And he’s right they do, just a few...more...tugs…)_

_“Tell me she’s lying. ASSHOLE!!! Tell me you didn’t do it!!!”_

_“I… had… to.”_

_(And here Peter has to remind himself to keep pulling, because Aunt May, Mr. Stark, Mrs. Potts-Stark, Ned, and MJ, (beautiful, sarcastic MJ), are his world, and he would gladly give up anything to keep them safe. He thinks that if he had a daughter, (and he tries not to imagine a little girl with his eyes, Michelle’s skin and hair, his brain, and MJ’s passion), he would jump in front of a killing blow, and throw away all of his dreams, just to keep her safe._

_“No, you didn’t… No, you didn’t… NO, YOU DIDN’T!!!”_

_“Quill!”_

_(And in his grief, the other Peter starts to pound at Thanos, and Peter Parker has a sinking feeling that something is about to go horribly wrong, as Mr. Stark moves to stop him, and he’s left grasping the gauntlet all by himself, and that empath doesn’t look like she can hold it much longer. Pain might hurt, but it also keeps you awake, and Peter thinks that this is bad for their plan, but he can’t tell when something is going to happen, because his darn Spidey-Senses have been going haywire since the donut ship first touched down in New York.)_

_“Hey, stop! Hey, stop! Stop! Hey, stop! Stop!”_

_“It’s coming! It’s coming! I got it! I got it…!!”_

_(But suddenly the gauntlet is sliding, sliding, and it’s going to work, and the first thing he’s going to do when he gets back is give May a huge hug and breath in the scent of the orange shampoo she always wore, the one that Ben had loved.)_

_(He’s spoken too soon, because just as the accursed glove comes sliding off, the titan awakes, and snatches it back, sending Peter and Mantis flying backwards, and Peter hugs her tightly to get her to safety, watching in horror out of the corner of his eye as Thanos throws a literal moon onto his totally-not-father-figure.)_  
**_————————————_ **

_(Peter has a sinking feeling that not everyone is making it off of this planet alive. And as he watches Mr. Stark expend all of his efforts for only a cut on the side of Thanos’ head…he decides that it will not be Iron Man who dies alone on an abandoned hunk of rock, not when he has a wife and a life to go back to. So as Thanos launches Mr. Stark’s nanite weapon back at him, he lunges, ignoring Tony’s cry of shock as he feels painpainpain in his abdomen, because gods-darnit, he will not watch another parental figure die.)_

_(And then suddenly Mr. Doctor Strange is there, exchanging Peter’s own life for the Time Stone that he was sworn to protect. All Peter can think is whywhywhy because he must have had a reason, but as Thanos vanishes, and his Dad gives a quiet sob as he uses a mixture of webs and nanites to contain Peter’s injury, he’s just angry. Because if he’s going to die now then it will have been in vain, because the purple grape is surely headed toward Earth for the mind stone, and everything will have been for nothing.)_

_(They sit in depressed silence for who knows how long, none of them even talking. Peter can’t decipher what Mr. Stark is thinking from the look on his face, but just as he opens his mouth, something shifts.)_

_(Suddenly, Peter is watching in horror as around him, the guardians start to fall apart, turning to ash and floating away as if there was a breeze on this hideous hunk of rock. His confusion turns to dread as Tony stumbles, before turning to him.)_

_“Peter, everything’s going to be alright. I think we both know what’s happening. He did it. And I want you to know that,” (here he stops to gasp as the tips of his fingers begin to disintegrate), “that I love you, Underoos._

_“If”, he shudders like a leaf on a cold autumn night, “If Pepper’s okay...you protect her for me, Pete. You’ll be the best of us, but promise me, protect…”_

_(And then he’s gonegonegone , and Peter is left on a planet he can barely stand to look at with debris all around him, deep gouges in the surface of the orange-ish dirt, because he’s alone save for the Android-Lady, with the ashes on stony streaking his hands and face. It makes him want to puke, or cry. He doesn’t know or particularly care which.)_  
**FLASHBACK END**


	2. Drifting

Peter has been on this spaceship for long enough that he's starting to come to terms with the possibility that they might not make it back to Earth.

The first day had been filled with overwhelming pain and grief. He had barely spoken a word since leaving Titan, except to ask for the name of his companion, (which was Nebula, and if he hadn’t been internally beating himself up, he probably would have commented on how cool that was). They portioned out food and water, because the truth was that neither of them were sure that they would make it out of space at all. They came to an agreement that there was only so much oxygen left on the ship, enough for maybe 2 or 3 weeks if they’re careful, and decisively leave each other to mourn. (Peter is sure that Nebula can hear his sobs through her walls at night, but is kind enough not to mention it.)

4 days pass, and Peter really hates his advanced metabolism, because Nebula needs food too, but it’s almost painful to give back the portion of her own meals that she offers him. They've opened up to each other a bit: it's hard not to when you're stuck drifting in space with only each other as company. She’s...different, but he finds that he likes it. She isn’t afraid to tell it like it is.

By the end of week 1, Peter is bored. He’s listened to Quill’s two cassette tapes repeatedly until he got sick of the really old music, played Groot’s hand-held device which acts a bit like a gameboy, until the batteries ran out, and taught Nebula how to play finger football, which she enjoys. They get very competitive.

He spends the next few days helping Nebula fix and update everything that they can on the ship, (and if his heart simultaneously breaks and leaps every time he picks up the tools, Nebula doesn’t need to know. He’s just gotten comfortable enough with her that she'll let him help, trust him to help, and Peter thinks that if he didn’t have that responsibility to keep his mind off of his failures, he would have gone insane already.)

He’s 17, (as he’s pretty sure his birthday has passed by now), and they split the last piece of fruit. After their “meal”, Nebula looks at him to speak, as they’ve taken to doing in the evenings. He sleeps more and more each day, the longer they’re in space, but each evening, they sit and share stories. For a cyborg/android, (and he’s had enough tact not to ask about the correct term), Nebula is a surprisingly good listener.

He tells her of May, of Ned, of his adventures as Spider-Man, and she speaks of growing up under Thanos. He speaks of MJ, who he had loved, possibly, and how scared he is to not make it back to her. Or...that is, if she’s still there. A shiver runs through him at the thought. In return, she speaks of Gamora, her sister who, even when she hated it, was always by her side to pull her up when she fell.

Eventually, they come to the topic of Mr. Stark.

Peter speaks tentatively, each word hurting him to say, but Nebula is a good audience. He speaks of the Stark Expo, a drone targeting him, and even as a 6 year old, he stepped out into the danger instead of running away. “Nice job, Kid”,his mentor’s words from that day haunt his brain.

He speaks of the plane crash that killed his parents, growing up with May and Ben, the spider bite. His companion listens intently of how Peter speaks of his Uncle's demise: he had been buying groceries from a small corner store, whose clerk had never hesitated to snap at his Uncle, despite the man having been nothing but kind and respectful to him. So, when a man came in to rob the store, Peter left it be, considering it karma. But it was only around ten minutes later when he heard a gunshot ring out only a few streets away from where he was waiting for Ben. Sprinting in terror, he had just gotten a glimpse of the shooter’s face before he fled: the very same man from the store, who Peter had not even realized was carrying a gun on his person. His uncle bled out in his arms, but not before looking at him knowingly, and leaving him with the advice “With great power, comes great responsibility.”

A few weeks later, the vigilante known as Spider-Man appeared in the streets of Queens.

He speaks off coming home one day, at 15, and finding Tony Stark sitting on his couch, spouting off a lie about a September foundation Internship, and whisking him off to Germany to fight Captain America.

Peter describes how exhilarating it was: to have your childhood hero need your help. But...months passed, and he wasn’t called in again. The man that Tony had left as a contact didn’t respond to his many texts, and it all came to a head when Mr. Stark sent a suit to pull him out of a lake, where he had been dropped by a baddie.

Tony….well he was new to the mentoring thing. He didn’t handle the situation very well, and Peter was too stubborn to let someone else handle it. Alien tech got involved, and the Washington monument, the ferry incident, and homecoming are all dictated in great detail.

“He never knew,” Peter says reflecting,”about the building. And I turned down the invitation to become an Avenger. But...after that, he decided not to sell the tower, to keep an eye on me. I started getting text invitations to evenings in the lab, and movie nights, and dinners with him and Ms. Potts—Mrs. Stark, now. He…he was like my dad. And now he's gone, and I couldn’t save him.”

Nebula is silent, for a moment. “At least…” she said with an odd, almost wistful tone in her voice, “At least you got to see him, he last time. Gamora died alone, and in pain. You have memories of happy times.”

They’re much closer, more open with each other, after that.

In the last week, when their food is almost gone, as is the water, and the oxygen sparing, Peter manages to have Karen adjust his mask to leave messages for people, although the signal is too stretched to make contact with FRIDAY. In the event that he doesn’t make it, well...he holds out hope that somehow the mask will find its way to earth.

“Hey May”, the recording says, sounding a bit downcast. “We’ve been on this ship, drifting in the atmosphere, for about 3 weeks. It’s hard to keep track of the days, by now. I just want you to know, that...that I larb you. I larb you, May. And I know you’re not my mom, and you’ve always said never to call you that, but I just want you to know that if anything happens to me, I never minded not having a mom because I had a May, and that was just as good.I’m sorry for leaving you, but...I don’t regret the choice i made to help. Uncle Ben always said that with great power comes great responsibility, and as long as I have these powers, it’ll be my responsibility to help protect people. How can I be the Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man if there's no neighborhood?” He stops and gives a short laugh. Anyways, just know that I’ll always be watching over you.”

“For Ned”, Peter gives a weak smile into the camera. “Edward. Ned. Guy In The chair. I want you to know that you’ll always be my best friend. You’ve always been there for me. I want you to live your life: don’t forget about me, but please move on. Find a new bet friend. Ask Betty on a date. I love you, man.”

“MJ”, he gives a fond but wistful smile. “I wasn’t sure that I was going to leave this message. If I’m gone, will it hurt you more than it helps? But I have to get it off of my chest. I love you, Michelle, and not as a friend. I’m in love with you. I know you always say that women should not have value based on their looks, and that right there is a good reason why I’ve fallen for you. You’re beautiful, your smile lights up my world, but you don’t flaunt it. You're always there to deflate my ego, and I love your activism and your passion for social issues and literature. So if you’re alive to see this...just know that I would have been honored to grow up and have a future with you. I don’t know that. You feel the same way, you probably don’t, but if so, please move on. Remember me fondly, but do great things with your lif. I know you can.”

“Ms. Potts—“ Peter gives a small noise that sounds like a cross between a hiccup and a sob. “Pepper. You always try to get me to call you Pepper. I’m so sorrry, that Mr. Stark is—-is one. You loved him. I loved him...but that probably doesn’t help. It’s my fault he’s gone—Dr. Strange traded my life for the time stone, and if he hadn’t gotten that, Tony wouldn’t have d-died. I didn’t know you super well, but I loved what I did meet. Thank you for welcoming me into your home—into your family dynamics, in a way. I’m sorry. If I’m going to die, you should know—Tony’s last words were for me to protect you, if you’re still alive. I apologize for failing him one last time.”

Later, at Nebula’s insistence, he lies down on his side to rest, eyes drifting shut, before he notices them moving, something beyond his closed eyelids getting painfully bright.

Looking out the window in drowsy awe, he shouts for his companion. “Wow,” he breathes, “God IS a woman.”


End file.
